Hill Cane, River cane, Bamboo?

[Hawkdancer]

What are the similarities and differences amongst the canes and bamboos?  Treat them all the same, each has it's own peculiar traits, habitat, etc?  Now that I got it, what do I do with it?  Make arrows, of course! Hill cane, I assume, prefers a drier habitat than River cane, and bamboo varies it's preferences by species?  Thanks,
Hawkdancer

[Pat B]

Basically our canes, hill, switch and river cane are bamboos. I think they are all basically the same as far as working with them. Even the exotic bamboos are too. Some make better arrows that others but other than that they all work the same. The individual characteristics make one better that the others. I say that hill cane is the best of our native canes because the walls are thicker, the culm is rounder, nodes less pronounced and the taper is constant. There are other bamboos that make better arrows but they are less available. I'm fortunate to have hill cane growing along our creek.
 I don't think the humidity makes that much difference because all the native canes come from the generally humid Southeast US.